Reminiscence
by charliespike18
Summary: It was the end. That day. 'The end of an era. Alan gone, Billy dead and Martha's god knows where, and I am the only one left. It isn't the same, not at all. Shoe Lane still has the same name and is doing better than it was with Alan and Billy at the helm, but… and that's where I fall down, why isn't the fact that it's doing better enough' Clive muses about the past.
1. Chapter 1

Don't laugh if someone in the room is crying. Always smile when you pass a judge. Red wine is better than white. French is crap to do at A level if you want to be a lawyer. You shouldn't fuck your pupils. Oh and that 'happy ever after's' only happen in fairy tales. Just some of the advice that Martha Costello has ever given me.

I didn't believe the last one when she first told me... I always thought that somehow I'd get my happy ever after, you know - good job, hot wife, all that stuff, but now, I finally realised she was right. Only it's far too late for that, it if I'm being honest.

I saw her yesterday, Martha I mean, and that's when I decided that all that happy ever after stuff was bollocks. I was in Manchester, prosecuting a drunken man for stabbing his sister, and I saw her in that stupid car of hers. The blue sports car she's owned since 2003. I have no clue where the hell she was going. Though if I'm being honest, I'm not particularly well versed in the geography of Manchester. Also, if I'm being honest, I'm not particularly sure it was her.

I'm not going crazy or anything, it was just a split second thing though, a car driving past and blonde girl at the wheel. It just… just seemed like her if you know what I mean. No, I don't even know what I mean so you have no hope. I think it was the shock to, not of seeing her again, no, just simply thinking about her again. I've tried my best over the years to forget the pain associated with her, with bloody Martha Costello, but the mere idea that I could, possibly, see her again made the pain come back with a vengeance. I was so sure I gotten over it, shows how wrong I was, and I'm not wrong often.

I moved on, of course, but everything after seemed tinged with the fact it was post Martha, post Billy too if I think about it. That was one hell of a day. Becoming Head of Chambers, Billy dying and Martha leaving. I even managed to put them in order of importance, with Martha's absence seemingly as permanent as Billy's. But know it seems it might not be, that unnerves me, the fact that she could – possibly and probably in my head – be part of my future again. The Martha I remember and the Martha I could encounter again might be two completely separate entities.

She could hate me, and I for one wouldn't particularly blame her for it. But I think I could cope with that though, if she was the same, if I still knew her but she hated me. What I dread is that she could be different – I know how self-centred that sounds, of course people changed, god I've changed - but not her, never her, she has always been the same.

I pretend that it's not the reason and make up bollocks about us booth maturing and growing apart to make it feel better but it doesn't work; it always comes back to the fact that I am scared.

I am never scared.

Apart from when it comes to Martha. I was too scared to tell her how I felt until it was too late, too scared to tell her to stay. Now I'm too scared to find out if she's changed.

I remember the last piece of advice my father told me before I was packed off to boarding school; Don't ever show people you're scared – if possible try not to get scared, it's not good for the character.

Well sod it dad, why can't you show people how you feel, Martha did and she coped fine. Until the end, that was. Calling the 'end' makes it sound awfully ominous, doesn't it? It was the end though, really, wasn't it. The end of an era. Alan gone, Billy dead and Martha's god knows where, and I am the only one left. It isn't the same, not at all. Shoe Lane still has the same name and if I'm being brutally honest, is doing better than it was with Alan and Billy at the helm, but… and that's where I fall down, why isn't the fact that it's doing better enough?

I spend more time reminiscing for a time I helped conspire to end than I thought I ever would. I sit in my office - the same office I shared with Martha because when the push came to the shove I wanted to keep at least one thing the same while everything else was changing - and just close my eyes. It's ridiculously easy for me to sit there and pretend that nothing did change, that Alan could pop in at any moment and ask me how my days going or Billy could rush in and place a new case in front of me even though I already have one or that Martha could enter, fresh from court, ranting about how her client should have got 'not Guilty'. Stupidly easy, and also very painful because when someone actually enters, bringing me out of my stupor, it hurts like it had just happened all over again.

I went out for a drink with John the other day, and I realised that he was the only one left at Shoe Lane who had really known it in its previous incarnation. The only person who remembered Alan, Billy, Martha and I working as some sort of super team. That was just before I left for Manchester, where I might or might not have seen Martha, and we sat in the pub and talked about her. About Martha. I don't really know why he started talking about her, he just did. Started going on about how good she was as a lawyer, how good it would be to have someone like her prosecuting for us, except she never would, being a staunch defence barrister.

I'm still in Manchester. I'm going home tomorrow. But tonight I think I'm going to pretend that waiting for me back in London are Billy and Martha and Shoe Lane just as it was. I know I shouldn't - my job is better than ever, I actually have a stable girlfriend and_ I'm happy_ but Martha's words, I think, will always echo in my mind.

'Happy ever after's' only happen in fairy tales.


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N Hey, this chapter is from Martha's POV. **

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**He was in my dream.**

He was in my dream last night. It's not strange that he appears, he was such a large part of my life for so long he was bound to pop up at some point. But last night was different. I dreamt he said he loved me. I've dreamt about him six times since I last saw him, not that I keep count, I just know. That part of my life, the part I spent with him and Billy at Shoe Lane just seems like such a different part of my life and every time he makes an appearance in my dreams I'm reminded of how much it hurt to watch it go. Every time I'd dreamt about him in the past had been different. He'd just been there helping me do something or he was just someone I had to save from some horrible fate. He had never spoken before. He never really became a big part of my dream, always just a cameo but this time he was the lead. Dreams with Clive included just seem to pop out from nowhere, no trigger, he's just there. There was a trigger this time so I guess I should have expected it.

I saw him yesterday. I'm staying in Manchester. My husband's parents live here so I'm a frequent visitor. My husband, even though we've been married for six years now it seems weird to call him that. My life seems split in to two parts, Shoe Lane and after Shoe Lane, and in a way everything at Shoe Lane doesn't seem particularly real anymore. Of course it was real, it happened and yet sometimes I think about it in a way that makes it seem like it all happened to someone else. That's, I think, why seeing Clive yesterday stunned me, it made it all seem more real, more tangible.

I was driving along, stopped at a red light and there he was. Just standing there, I doubt that he saw me; even if he did he probably wouldn't think twice about it. I've heard Shoe Lane is doing very well as a prosecuting chambers, I've also heard that Clive is doing extremely well for himself. Without Billy and me he has seemed to flourish. That hurts even though it shouldn't.

I read about Billy's death in the newspaper. That hurt too. I was too much of a coward to go and see him again. I know he died the same day I left and Clive became Head of Chambers. Well what a day that turned out to be. I just couldn't cope with losing everything. The case, chambers, Clive. Billy too, but I hadn't known that at the time. I never said goodbye, not to Clive or Billy. I knew that the likelihood of me seeing Clive again was reasonably high. But I managed six years where Shoe Lane was just a figment of my imagination

My husband's name is Aiden, I met him on a train and I don't think I love him enough. He loves me like I'm the only person on earth and that makes me feel guilty because I know I will never love him as much as he loves me. It's not fair on him but I can't bring myself to tell him. Clive is the only person I've ever come close to loving and sometimes, when I look at Aiden, I think there must be something wrong with me, something that means I can't love anything as much as I should.

I blame Clive, though really it's my fault. But If Clive hadn't decided prosecuting was the way to go and if I hadn't' have become so involved with Sean's case, If Clive hadn't slept with Harriet. If if if. Then maybe we might have been happy. But that's far too many 'if's' for my liking, so it probably wouldn't have worked anyway. The defence lawyer from Bolton and the prosecuting posh boy, no, of course it wouldn't've worked, who was I trying to kid?

There's also one other 'if' I always come back to when I think about him. What If I hadn't lost the baby. What would have happened, I highly doubt I'd been sitting in a hotel in Manchester married to a man called Aiden but you never know? But then again maybe I would be married to Clive, still living London and working at Shoe Lane. I would have a child. Maybe Harriet wouldn't have corrupted Clive and Billy might not have taken backhanders from Mickey Joy. Billy would still be dead but I would have been able to say goodbye. Maybe everything would be different. Maybe everything would've be the same. Again I'm talking about hundreds of 'maybe's' and 'if's' and 'what could have been's'.

Aiden doesn't know about the miscarriage. He didn't really need to know and we never really talked about children. Like all of the things that happened back then it feels like it happened to someone else. But at least that person was the real Martha Costello. I, now, feel like some pale imitation of the person I used to be. I'm a different woman and I'm not sure if that a good or bad thing.

For today a least all those things that happened feel like they really happened to me. If wanted I could hop on a train and go see Clive and Shoe Lane. And become the real Martha once again. But… but I left that all behind and I have so much to lose if I go back. So, that Martha will always be confined to the past and all the 'what could have been's'

The thing that saddens me the most is that when I woke up this morning, in the moment before reality kicked in and I was half asleep and half-awake, I could've sworn I was about to start a day were I'd get up and go to Shoe Lane and Alan and Billy and Clive would've been waiting for me.

I miss Clive and I miss Billy, but things are far too gone to go back now.

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**A/N Hope you like it. Please review if possible. Charliexx **


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